[125] Prof. W. R. Smith, _Kinship and Marriage_, p. 69.
Before the separation of the Hebrews and Aramæans, the wife remained within her own tent where she received her husband, the children of such unions taking her name and becoming her heirs. This kind of conjugal union is known to have been in existence in many portions of the world. In Ceylon it is designated as the _beena_ marriage.
In ancient Arabia, not only did women control their own homes, but they owned flocks and herds, and were absolutely independent of male relations. As late as the fourteenth century of our era, although the women of certain Arabian tribes were willing to marry strangers, they never followed them to their homes.
Among the Bedouins it is a rare thing for a woman at marriage to leave her home and kindred. When a woman marries a man he settles among her kinsmen, and, as she presents him with a spear and a tent by way of dowry, it would seem that he is expected to join her relations and assist in the common defence. The marks of authority under gentile rule are the possession of a tent and a lance; yet we find that these are the objects which, under matriarchal usages, the wife tenders her husband when he enters her family; the first doubtless as a symbol of her protection, the second as indicating her authority and the services which he is expected to render her and her people. Until a late period in Rome it was the custom, during the solemnities of marriage, to pass a lance over the head of the wife in token of the power which the husband was about to gain over her.[126]
[126] Ortolan, _History of Roman Law_, p. 80.
Under the two types of marriage—namely, _motă_ and _ba’al_—the positions of women were so diametrically opposed that both could not continue, hence when under the pressure brought to bear upon them, women began to accept the _ba’al_ form of marriage within their own _hayy_, _motă_ unions were doomed. Of the more ancient form of marriage in Arabia, under which the woman chooses her mate, evidences of which are still extant in that country, and that by capture under which she becomes the slave of her lord, Professor Smith says:
There is then abundant evidence that the ancient Arabs practised marriage by capture. And we see that the type of marriage so constituted is altogether different from those unions of which the _motă_ is a survival, and kinship through women the necessary accompaniment. In the one case the woman chooses and dismisses her husband at will, in the other she has lost the right to dispose of her person and so the right of divorce lies only with the husband; in the one case the woman receives the husband in her own tent, among her own people, in the other she is brought home to his tent and people; in the one case the children are brought up under the protection of the mother’s kin and are of her blood, in the other they remain with the father’s kindred and are of his blood.
